Quantum Entanglement
by Larken
Summary: He would have laughed. He would have never imagined that this singular particle could send him so far away, could do so much as to change reality, or more accurately, change how he understood it. (Lutece fanfic)
1. Chapter 1

It was odd. Entirely odd. Yet not as odd as fascinating. Something occurred that mere moments before he would have thought nigh inconceivable.

A single particle, one quantum particle out of the dozens he had selected for his research, without any prompting of his own, reacted. It vibrated. It shimmered. It defied the bounds of his logic.

The morning started normally enough. The daily routine of self-grooming, attending to the scientific inquires of investors and miscellaneous mail, yet none of it so important as to compare to his work. Efficiency in the name of science.

He had to check. He just had to. Twice. Thrice. One more time. The volt meter read zero. It laid there, this red sliver still on its side pointing to a gaping number. Yes, he finally accepted, most assuredly dead. The generator was not turned on. No electricity stimulated his atom. Well, not any of his.

His atom flashed on and off, at varying intervals. Random but impressive. He suppressed a small chuckle. His body heaved back in his chair. The metal feet scraped back against the linoleum floor. He took quick glances around his surroundings. This was no dream. This was real. His mind exploded with sudden theories and possibilities.

He bolted from his chair and strode across the room to the generator. A massive monolith of cold grey steel sat before him. He checked the nearby dials and started to pull some of the levers. Instantly the dials jumped to appropriate levels, much to his satisfaction. The generator whirred as the magnets and coils worked to power his means of affecting his atom. The dead machine in the midst of the laboratory hummed into life. Making way to a cluttered wood desk, Robert glanced ambitiously at the newly awoken machine safely warming up before rummaging through his files. He tore through his drawers to find a battered and tarnished red leather folder. It was filled to the point it could never be properly closed. The brass clasp swung uselessly, clinking softly against its catch as his removed the folder from the dark hole of his considered fruitless theories. He dove into its contents and seized his calculations on the frequencies of his particle.

He swiftly scanned the mathematics and principles, the pending Lutece Field. What would happen, he hypothesized, if he interacted with the particle while it was flashing, while it defied the laws of his understanding. Would it simply stop, become as still and composed as before denying him its secrets? Disappear into nothingness, into somewhere he could not follow? Transpose itself into another dimension?

I have to act now, he thought. What is happening might not last forever. Will not, perhaps then. But it is now and now was what he could do with.

"Haha," Robert laughed as he ran, carefully avoiding the loose tumble of wires upon the floor, to his seat by the machine. "You, my little quantum particle, you will reveal everything you have to me. I know. I just know it. You will be my valet a new world." An ambitious grin splayed itself across his face. He spread out the calculations on an aluminum table beside him. He knocked away a nearby stack of papers to reveal a small assortment of pens, some leaking, others quite empty. The excited force at which he seized one rolled the others off the table. On the last, nearly empty sheet, he jotted down the first of his data.

"August 23rd, 1891 11:57 AM." He started; the pen scribbling furiously as he composed the beginnings of his findings. "Particle 47 has shown unusual signs of activity. The particle changes frequency without any visible prompting. As the particle changes frequencies, the particle-"

A knock on the doors stopped him abruptly as well as unleashing an immediate torrent of frustration. He turned from his work to the mahogany doors of his laboratory. He scowled.

"Go away. Gerald, escort him out! I will have none of this person's business today or any day from this day whatsoever. A Lutece will not be disturbed," scolded Robert. He gave the doors a moment to reply before engorging himself upon his work once more. He maneuvered towards his machine, now awaiting his commands. The particle was no longer flashing. It was still, a tiny sun-like entity, bathing the innards of his machine in a low, pale light. The light, however as beautiful as it was akin to the soft draping of a white fog about a spring morning, it obscured his observations. As he watched, recording its frequencies and energy levels, it blinked.

Robert paid slight attention, his efforts consumed entirely by recording the gigantic influx of data graphed nearby. It blinked again. Robert casted an eye and wrote faster. Once more, it turned itself off for that fraction of a moment. Robert forced himself away from the view, back to the table for more calculations. The knocking of the doors returned, much more vigorously. Robert proclaimed once more.

"Enough. Gerald, you are my butler, and I expect you to follow my orders the first time round! Whoever that is that needs my attention is not welcome to-day!" Robert dropped everything he held and strode back to the particle. Particle 47 blinked at regular intervals, about once a second, a pattern, not entropy.

Almost like a signal, he concluded. A signal, he mouthed. His brow furled in thought. If it was indeed a signal, then from where? How? Yet, more pressingly of all, by who? His musings never made it farther than that. A thundering crack tore him away from his privacy. The splinters of wood scattered at his feet. Robert stared, mouth gaping at his missing doors. His butler cowered in the corner.

A burly, heavyset man lumbered in. His fist slightly bloodied by the brute force of punching down inches of thick hardwood. Behind this humanoid beast came a smaller, leaner man, dressed in a tallowed tailored great coat and a mustard vest with a crimson necktie. His ebony cane tapped the linoleum. One. Two. Three. The leaner man confronted Robert Lutece, only inches away. His pencil moustache twitched upwards as the lean man made a wry smile. The dark eyes gleamed malevolently behind the shadows. Robert knew him. He stifled a sigh, a boiling frustration, and composed himself, proudly and gentlemanly, letting the lean man meet a tightlipped, straight-faced Lutece.

"Do you have anything to say for yourself, Mr. Lutece?" The lean man spoke, softly, whispering. He took a handkerchief from his coat pocket and started to clean the ruby knob of his cane, idling ignoring Robert as is he expected the reply to come from someone else. As if I would be disarmed by such petty attempts of distraction, Robert seethed.

"My laboratory is not a place for you to polish your broken ego." Robert stated. The lean man shrugged and replaced his handkerchief, slowly, deliberately, yet his gaze never left Robert's. As for Robert, he broke contact for a second, eyeing the large beast outline by the door arch, waiting.

"Oh, always the kidder aren't you? But your laboratory is where I fill my coffers, understand? You have provided me with your patents, your trifling inventions, your dubious theories, and I in turn, provide you with silver. Lots of silver. Quite a lot these past few months," the lean man laughed, shrill and short. Robert stood there, unflappable at the man's attempt at camaraderie. The lean man lifted his arm and motioned the beast forward. His smile melted into an acerbic frown. "Quite a lot Lutece, for nothing. What are you doing here? I expect means for profit. If I'm happy, you get to be too with your damned experiments and numbers. So, do you think I am a happy person right now?"

"No, not you, but the man you gambled with last night though, yes. Yes, he is." The lean man growled. Robert was unfazed by the malcontent. It's a shame, he thought, that this brute never bets his life away. In fact, I might even enjoy being betted away. Robert heard the cracking of knuckles much too clearly for his liking.

"I want money, Lutece."

"It's not my head that will be rolling by the end of this week." Robert fired back, his frustration of abandoning a new quantum prospect burned down his better intentions and tact. The lean man pushed Robert against his machine.

"I own you," the man threatened. Robert gave a snide laugh in return.

"No you don't." The man raised his cane in attack, but left it there, hanging above them. I knew it. I am his only source of income, Robert assured himself. He wouldn't dare. The lean man dropped the cane and instead made a quick motion with his hand. The beast perked to attention.

"Wreck the place, only slightly though." Robert's stone façade shattered. A startling fear gripped his heart. He protested.

"No, what are you doing?" Robert watched helplessly as the beast overturned nearby tables, trampling valuable research and ripping apart folders. Robert confronted the beast only to be pathetically thrown aside. "No!"

"Stop." The lean man pronounced. The beast obeyed and lumbered back over to his master. "You have a week Lutece." They left him in the midst of destruction, shaking and pale. Robert scolded himself. I should have kept my mouth shut. That was all I needed to do. Robert swore under his breath and surveyed the destruction around him. Most salvageable, hopefully. He stirred to his feet and went on recovering his notes. In his duty, Gerald approached.

"Sir, shall I aid you?" Robert sighed.

"No, no. Just get out Gerald. Attend to something," Robert huffed. "Anything but me." Gerald made a shallow bow and exited the laboratory. Robert replaced an aluminum table and piled the better notes upon it. He at last smiled. Most of the notes for the Lutece Field were intact. Nothing he could not replicate with the particle. Robert started and ran towards the machine. The particle was no long aglow.

Robert clenched his fist and rested on the steel coverings. Sullenly, Robert closed his eyes and thought. He always thought, mostly upon possibilities and probabilities. Would he ever get that chance again? A possibility, he thought, but not probable. His hand moved to a knob and he watched. He watched as his particle glowed, only this time by his hands. He repeated the signal, one blink every second. There is always a possibility, no matter how slight. He tried this for a time he did not count. There must be. At last, he stopped and the particle lay as comatose as before.

The laboratory was set back to working order, crudely as many papers still littered the grounds. A dull moonlight filtered in from the shuttered windows. A dim lamplight illuminated his hands as they replaced the tattered research of the morning. While his hands busied themselves with menial work, his mind set off entertaining an idea that had plagued him since the inconceivable discovery. What makes it possible for a particle that had been observed for months to be considered relatively stable to act so irrationally? If nothing affected it, then what made it change? To change, it must be affected by something.

"But that something is not here," Robert whispered. "Then it must be somewhere else, wherever else is. So where else is my particle?" He had read about it so long ago, a theory that everything in the universe was the creation of a single electron. That everything was connected in such a way, protons and neutrons created the atom cores yet shared among all of them was a single electron defying space and time to be everywhere and everytime at once. Robert scoffed and lay back in his chair. His gaze moved to the machine that housed his particle. If his particle worked like the single electron, where else was his particle? Who else had found it?

Could he contact this person? Robert held that idea on the tip of his tongue. I would think it highly probable. The laboratory once more hummed to life and Robert checked the gauges on the generator. Soon particle 47 flickered on, dispelling the darkness in its cage. He had an idea, an absurd idea. Morse code. It could work. It must.

It was a short message, clear and straight to the point. "I am Robert Lutece. Who are you?"

x-x

It's something different, a fancy really. I hope I do justice.


	2. Chapter 2

A fine brisk morning greeted the denizens of High Columbia. But then again, it was nigh always a fine brisk morning, a fine auburn afternoon, and pleasantly cool night. Not that Rosalind Lutece ever happened to enjoy such weather. The city of the sky basked in the light of the finest rays. The wonderful flora and exquisite cafes were always lovely and lively. Not that Rosalind Lutece ever saw, smelled, or partaken in. Indeed, not that Rosalind Lutece ever did anything, it was in fact, she did do nothing that the Columbian denizens ever considered as normal. She preferred not the natural sun but the artificial fluorescent lights that illuminated her laboratory. She preferred the sterile environment of steel machinery and the cleanliness of finely tailored notes. Most ladies would love to be taken out abound to a suave theatre or a tantalizing course at a local restaurant.

These ladies would not enjoy the maths, or the work, or the lack of gossip. To which, she must do at some point remind her neighbor, Miss Starling, that she as a respected member of the scientific community does not gossip. Not that it would have mattered. The female Starling had quite the irritating ability to not hear and to her, a woman was a woman and all women were just like her. It was during one of these awkward moments of female fellowship that Rosalind realized she was alone. No amount of force friendliness or scientific dissertation would change that. She talked only to the particles and theories of her mind.

So one day, the universe saw her plight, though she would have never openly admitted it, and replied back.

The morning was swamped entirely by the furnishing of her new laboratory and home at last granted to her by Zachary Comstock. After a year in the city, Rosalind Lutece was finally satisfied with a proper laboratory. Indeed, now real progress could be made free from distractions and infuriating inquiries. She stood by the door frame as the doors themselves had yet to be mounted, watching the workmen install the equipment, scrutinizing how they were handled. The whole concept of a Laboratory Lutece brought up the deal she made so long ago. It was a natural decision, she was promised funding for her theories and inventions as long as she aided sometimes the rise of his city. It had been simple enough to manufacture the floating cities on earth to heave to the heavens Comstock's Columbia and now, neither politics or lack the funds would ever bother her.

Eventually she felt decently confident with them and attended to one machine installed in the middle of the room. This piece was the very first item installed in the building, she made sure of that. The machine housed her particle of intent, Particle 47. It would be here where she would continue to figure out the final enigmas of her Lutece Field. Rosalind could not help to wonder what was in store for her.

Now, these changes to her laboratory would have been relatively easy if Rosalind Lutece had not stayed in the same room, in the middle, in the way, working on her particle. The workers did not consider her incredibly obtrusive but still an obstruction nonetheless.

The stairwell was absolutely cluttered with various buildings materials and other mechanical implements ready to be moved in. Earlier it took Rosalind over a full hour to get to her laboratory from the above floor. Now, she was finally settled in her work. Searching her aluminum desk for a pen, she found some underneath some tattered envelopes but before she could apprehend one, a nearly worker dropped his toolbox, the tools sliding across the linoleum, and vibrated the table, rolling the pens off the side.

"Ah," she frowned. She walked around to the side where her pen now lie and bent over to pick them up, only to be shoved by another worker. "Oh, you oaf!"

The worker murmured slight apologies before moving on. Rosalind's frown deepened, but decided not to pursue him. She sat back down at her desk for the second time today, and hopefully, the only time. The few hours passed quite genially for both Rosalind and the workers until one of them dared to intrude upon her work.

"Ma'am, Madam Lutece, can you-" a worker spluttered, burdened by a load of steel and sprockets. The sweat pouring down his face came in rivulets. "Can you just move? A little?"

Not willing to tear herself away from her work to even look at the worker replied nonchalantly. "I can move, yes." Yet Rosalind made no motion to get up.

The worker groaned and strained to speak out again. "Um…ma'am, will you?"

"I will not," another terse reply. Rosalind toyed with the flickering of the particle while taking the occasional note. The worker clumsily adjusted his grip on the materials. The can of sprockets balanced precariously on the steel bars shook violently. He took a deep breath and tried to assert some command.

"It's a bit tight squeeze, ma'am." Rosalind dropped her notes and presented him with her annoyance.

"Then you should have considered your load more carefully." The worker groaned once more and turned around, back to the stairwell to drop off some of the steel. The worker was willing to turn around. The can of sprockets was not and fell with a thundering clattering on the desk in front of her. Rosalind was startled for half a second just dropping her pen with slight plink before composing herself. The worker however was nowhere near as reserved.

"I'm sorry miss!" He decried only to trip upon himself and release his load. The metal beams followed suit of the sprockets and laid themselves all over the floor not caring for the mortality of the tiles. "Uh, uh," the worker stammered. "We can replace them." Rosalind rolled her eyes and sighed before returning to her work.

"Why Fink ever recommended this renovation team I will never understand." The worker scratched behind his neck, waiting for the reprimand. Rosalind left him standing there for quite a time before the monumental tension finally caused her to order the worker back to his duties. She took a swift glance around her laboratory. Progress was slow but it was being made at the very least. Hopefully no more intrusions she thought.

"Lady Lutece!" It was her butler, Gerald, calling from the living room. "Miss Starling is here."

Rosalind shuddered as she heard Miss Starling's voice emanating through the walls. A theory, never hope for a better day, seldom does it not cause more trouble. She capped her pen and attended to the trespasser in her home. Yet Miss Starling was not to be easily rebuffed.

"Some tea, Miss Starling?" Gerald offered, pouring the hot liquid into a small china cup. Rosalind came into the living room quietly exasperated and looking none worse for wear. Miss Starling as Rosalind observed was as finely dressed as ever or at least she assumed so. Miss Starling picked up immediately upon seeing Rosalind and strode over, ignoring Gerald's offering in midair. The elder gentleman made no outcry and replaced the tea cup back onto the platter.

"Oh, Rosalind, why didn't you tell me where you were moving too?"

"It must have slipped my mind," Rosalind responded and added as an afterthought, "I don't suppose you will be leaving anytime soon?" Miss Starling mirthfully laughed and ended with an incredulous smile.

"As opposed to what Rosalind? Your particle? I can't honestly imagine you," Miss Starling paused. "Well, I can actually. That is a problem." She shook her finger. Rosalind crossed her arms.

"If undertaking what one loves is considered a social problem, then I cannot imagine that better candidate for example than you," the Lutece retorted. Miss Starling raised an eyebrow.

"There is a difference, Miss Lutece, there is a difference between enjoying life and having a healthy one," Miss Starling intoned. "Now do not take that the wrong way. I do not decry your choice of work, but I do against the time you put into it compared to everything else." Rosalind scoffed at the Starling's words. Starling only sighed and walked over to the nearby coffee table which had on top of it a basket of groceries next to a jar of peaches. "Do come visit the market with me some time, please."

"Everything I have is here and that is all I need," asserted Rosalind whereas Starling seemed as if she did not hear. Starling lifted the basket and gave small bow to both the butler and the aggravated Lutece.

"If you do not mind, Mr. Gerald, please remind later that Miss Lutece now has to care for a jar of peaches." The butler nodded. "I do believe they can be quite challenging at times."

"Of course, Lady Starling." The Starling gave a fleeting glance to Rosalind before being escorted out by Gerald.

"Rosalind," she started standing at the door, "Do try not to lie to yourself too often. " This statement provoked an instant frown. The nerve of that woman, she thought.

And so the day finished and the auburn waned and the workers cleared away, coming back tomorrow to continue the endeavor. Rosalind was left alone holding a yellow sheet entitling her to a replacement of the laboratory floor. Do they really expect me to pay for this, she thought as she eyed the fee. A theory, Fink is not to be trusted for anything involving money. The sheet was casted aside on her desk and the day's notes were collected into her arms. Carefully, she sidestepped the abandoned steel and wires to a much worn wooden desk. She brushed the loose papers aside and revealed a red leather folder. There her notes were kept safe and sound or even safer if the clasp actually closed she mused. She went by her generator and proceeded to shut it down or tried to.

"Gerald," she called. "Gerald!" Some moments later, the elderly gentleman sharply dressed in suit attire knocked on the open laboratory door. He bowed.

"Madame Lutece. What are your requests?" Rosalind pulled uselessly on the lever that connected to the Shock Jockey prototype Fink had asked her to test in her new lab. She huffed and swore under her breath. Gerald watched his mistress kick the generator in anger before attending to him. She brushed back a lock of fiery hair that had undergone disarray.

"Gerald, take the yellow slip on that desk and tell Fink that I will not pay for such incompetence." She started. Immediately after her request, the generator crackled and finally shut down. Rosalind crossed her arms and glared at the prototype. "And that his generator has more fits than Miss Starling."

"At this hour? It's the middle of the night!" The butler stated, reviewing the bill. "My, my, that is quite a sum."

"Yes, Gerald! Do it and then he will a taste of the frustration I felt this morning," she huffed, "and I want my old generator back." Gerald nodded while pocketing the bill. He bid his mistress good night and left, taking along a dark coat and hat.

Rosalind relaxed as she heard the door shut behind him. She took another seething look at the generator before preparing to finally get some sleep. She made it only as far as the machine that housed her particle.

It was glowing. Particle 47 was glowing. Rosalind stared at the machine then at the generator and then back. She scowled and tramped to the generator and gave it another sound kick. The steel shell resounded emptily and the particle was still shining. She was puzzled. Obviously, the generator was for all intents and purposes dead. So why is particle glowing if it is not me that is stimulating it, she questioned.

She ran back to the machine and watched the particle glow then flicker. Once. Twice, then constant. Her confusion only heightened. The particle was following a pattern that Rosalind could not follow. "What in the world," she whispered. It was too constant to be simply entropy.

"How is this possible?" Grabbing from a nearby stack of fresh paper, she jotted down the new behavior. She counted the flashes then made lines for the slightly longer flashes of the particle. The pattern repeats she observed after the particle made a decent pause. She scanned over her jottings. Her brow furled in thought. It is almost akin to, she paused in disbelief, Morse code.

"Inconceivable," she whispered again and glanced at her particle, flickering this impossible message. Could it even be a message? She let out a small laugh in astonishment. Rosalind pended her thoughts, trying to remember the sequences for the letters. And lo and behold did the universe reply one letter at a time.

The first clumping of sequences she decoded read out her name in the midst of other letters without context, -rt Lutece wh-. That was odder than odd. She was at a loss for words, for thought. The only thing that mattered at that very moment was that message. It became an instant obsession. What about me she assumed, how could this particle know things, how could it transmit these messages. The decoding went on revealing a question, who are you.

"Who am I?" Rosalind repeated incredulously to the particle. "You ask that now after being together for years?" The particle said nothing, still flashing its original message. She scoffed and finished the pattern. She dropped her pen for the third time that day. She read it again and again. Firstly, to fix the context. Secondly, to finally realize what she had just read and even then it seemed impossible as if she had just imagined the entire ordeal, a taunting dream.

"I am Robert Lutece. Who are you?" she repeated in a voice that could hardly be heard. Lutece? Who was this man that shared the same name as her, but more importantly, how did he hijack her particle?

It was tempting, entirely tempting to reply back immediately. With demands, of course, she mentally added. More kicking ensued as Rosalind beat the generator to life. She prepared her reply and turned from her side the knob to full, keeping the particle on, unable to flash.

x-x

Robert sighed in the darkness of his laboratory. Probability of success, nil, he thought as he repeated the signal over and over. A more grounded thought interjected. Who would answer him in the dead of night? Robert stopped his message in the face of sobering realizations. But then again, why would a quantum particle ever care what time of day it is?

"Nil, nil, nil," he reiterated as if to chastise the particle. "This is-"

An ecstatic grin was captured in the grey light of a glowing result. A reply. Unfortunately speaking, the universe has a sense of humor. The particle answered back wildly. A message much quicker than his. Robert hurried to write it down and once decoded and placed in context, was a tad off put. Inside him was a mixture of awe and utter indignation.

"I am Rosalind Lutece. Give me back my particle." At least I have affirmation that whoever this person is, she is indeed a Lutece, Robert mused.

x-x

Thank you for all the reviews and favorites! I'm glad you guys are enjoying it so far.


	3. Chapter 3

The evening waned on as the pale moon made his slow flight across a dark plane enlightened with a million torches. The mind decries darkness. It challenges, it scorns, it devours to make light, one fire at a time, until it can make its journey.

"Yours?" the particle flickered, a message that swept by so quickly as to almost inspire disdain. It went on to accuse, "Well, I beg to differ, Miss Lutece. It was you who intruded upon my work." Rosalind only crossed her arms. Her mouth contorted into tightlipped half smile. This is almost the pretenses of joke, she thought, and it may very well be.

"Correction, my work, Mister Lutece. I discovered this particle only two years ago. Have you not heard of my achievements?" She fired back. Robert shook his head and sighed. He knew nothing of what she did. He never even knew of another professor that shared his name. What was I expecting, he thought. Oh yes, a much more sane professor on the other side not some fool mocking my work. One hand toyed with a pen as a distraction while the other formulated his reply.

"Miss Lutece, I have never heard about you or anyone else in my particle's demesne. It is known here in fact that such work is solely mine and it is true that I as well discovered my particle two years ago. I suppose it did not take much research to find that out whoever you really are." Rosalind took a deep breath. The knuckles on one hand turned white. And to think I thought this monumental event would serve to overturn the disappointment of the morning. A fool's day I have been led into she derided.

"I refuse to believe you. Why would it be then if you had discovered the particle first that I would be the one chosen to raise Columbia?" He was struck genuinely confused. My particle to raise a district, absolutely preposterous. Theoretically possible, but the funding required would be astronomical, much more so a single benefactor. One needed a government and as if he could miss such an achievement that she claimed. There, it was decided. He was being played for a fool.

"Columbia? As in the District of Columbia?" Robert railed to Rosalind's growing vexation.

"No, Columbia, as in great flying city of American ideals." Again, Robert was left thunderstruck. He mouthed a small what and buried his face into his hands. This is idiotic he muttered. This- this is pathetic. I refuse to deal with this any longer.

"The Great Columbia never happened. It was an idea of extremists and no one took up the mantle. It was preposterous, a fancy of the public. A dying fad. None of anything you are saying is true. None of it ever happened." Robert was almost screaming at the particle. Rosalind had absolutely enough.

"You are insane." Robert bit his tongue to keep from crying out in the dead of night. The other Lutece kept on mocking, "It would be easier for both of us if you simply give up, Mr. Lutece, whatever game that you are playing. I do not know how you managed to toy with my particle but this is over." By now, both Luteces were infuriated, scowling and fuming.

"No. This is not over. This particle is mine. It is you who is wrong. What you think as the timeline is wrong. Everything is wrong. Messing with the work of a scientist is wrong," he accused.

"As if you understood that latter concept," fought back Rosalind.

"What will it take to convince you to stop?"

"What will it take you?"

"Fine, proof. Give me proof to your claims. Tell me your story."

"I do not think you will be so easily dissuaded unfortunately," the particle flickered. "After I founded my particle and demonstrated its practical applications, I was proposed a business fellowship by a Zachary Comstock which provided for my complete funding and lodging in exchange for leveraging an entire city." Robert true to Rosalind's prediction was unconvinced, but he still tried albeit reluctantly to justify its merit. So she manages a floating city, he discoursed, then this Comstock heralds the new Columbia. This is her reality, but my reality is different.

"Never heard of this Comstock. I found no one after my discovery not even after months of pandering. Unlike you, I do not live in a fantastical flying city. I live in a bare minimum flat to which more often than I am comfortable with cannot pay for. It is a miracle I do have someone to help pay off my debts."

"It's almost as if I hear jealousy."

"Do not squander my good will. So if I accept your reality, which is obviously not mine, where does that leave us?"

"With two realities, despite its impossibility." Rosalind had managed to belay the rise of her frustrations and was finally able to try to give the other Lutece the benefit of the doubt. This had gone on far too long to justify a joke. She had tried to imagine once what it would have been like if she had never received Comstock's aid. Firstly, Columbia would have never happened like in this man's reality. Secondly, she knew about her own deficiencies in politics and funds mongering, she would have had troubles like the man. Yet someone pays off his debts. Would she have someone like that? "Mr. Lutece, who pays off your debts?"

"Why would that matter?" Of course he would not answer that, she mumbled. It is an idiotic query. Just because he has some similarities does not mean he had all of them. That is impossible. Yet an odd feeling urged her on, a sort of intuition. She tried it anyways. She gave a name. It was an inconsequential name. If nothing came out of it, nothing came out of it. A feeling of alarm penetrated his mind.

"How do you know that?" The dots and dashes were unusually slow. He was treading carefully, disbelieving, concerned. Rosalind was deeply perturbed by the response. The name was a fancy of a prediction. One at most would have thought to have served as an irritant to the male Lutece.

"They were my neighbors," Rosalind explained.

"As was mine." A nervous laugh escaped from him. A certain feeling of dread arose within him. She traded the first half of the address of her childhood home. He recognized it as his home not hers.

"Finish the address." Robert did and left each other more anxious than before. Rosalind added more details about her childhood to which Robert continued in frighteningly close detail.

"How do you know all this?" Robert asked again.

"Because I experienced all of it."

"How? Those are my experiences. My life."

"Is it?"

Across the line, the response served not incense but to stoke a different fire, curiosity. Robert leaned forward in his chair; a hand cupped his chin in thought. He gazed at the now silent atom. A question, he thought, then a hypothesis. Is what this woman saying real? Yet despite his want for denial, the details were too close, too real. Two realities, obvious where they diverge but nonetheless eerily similar. They existed at the same time without being the same time. The lack of a good answer aggravated him far worse than this Rosalind Lutece. She does not exist here, but I do, he concluded, and where she is, I am not. Robert dropped his hand suddenly; his azure eyes alight. He wanted to test if she truly a Lutece, and not just any Lutece.

"So I have a question: Do I exist?" Robert did not get an immediate response. Rosalind had no response. She thought instead. What kind of a question is that, she pondered, do you exist. Then who am I talking to?

Yet contraries aside, she knew what this man was proposing as if he had voiced a small idea she had formulating in the back of her mind. I had never heard of you until a scant few minutes before even though you share my surname and happened to discover this particle at about the same span of time which is highly coincidental. In a manner of speaking, she conceded, this Robert Lutece did not exist even though he did.

"I am starting to believe that two realities are not as impossible as we might have thought. Which is why you send me that question, to see if I-" Robert immediately took over the messaging and finished her thought.

"I see, Mr. Lutece. Word for word." Rosalind patiently waited on the dead particle. She waited as she thought on this Robert and more she found her anger melt away to be replaced by interest, curiosity, and somehow concern. She wanted to know more about this man who shared her life yet was not her. "This is a puzzle that needs to be solved."

"Indeed," he complied with the same interest and went on to gently scold, "I suppose we will continue the possession rights debate of the particle at a later time?"

"I suppose only with a lawyer in tow." Rosalind riposted. Robert laughed.

"Then neither of us would get the particle." She smiled in return. For the first time that night, Rosalind allowed herself to feel at ease. Her azure eyes watched and waited for an answer.

"So Robert, tell me about yourself."

"From where?"

"Anywhere."

"Then you think so too." The particle stayed aglow, an undiscussed but somehow thoroughly understood sign that the author was in thought. The torrent started, climbing, building, into a nigh perfect mirror. Hours had passed unrealized as Robert and Rosalind continued their banter and probing. For every question answered came a myriad more. Their childhoods were exact minus irrelevant minor details. Perfectly mirrored were their triumphs and failures. They had copied each other's dreams and aspirations. They had attended the same university, published the same books, the same theories. It was as if they were with each other as their life unfolded before them. They stood side by side never looking over and now they knew.

"This is much to take in, Robert."

"As it is for me." Yet they were still unsatisfied. It was not enough to know that they were out there. There were many questions still left unanswered, entire portions of life still uncompared, yet they could not continue for the sheer obstacle of fatigue.

"The night ends quickly." Rosalind idly commented, surrounded by a cacophony of messy papers and codes. She stretched her arms. Sunlight streamed in through the windows over the cracked floor.

"So it does." Robert acquiesced. "Tired?"

"I did not have a particularly good morning and the strange expedition took the hours of sleep away."

"As did I but we have time for a good sleep now." The Luteces started to collect their notes.

"But there are still so many questions." She complained. A sharp knocking at the door alerted her to her butler's presence. She briefly acknowledged him to invite him in but then shifted back to Robert's message. The butler entered, surprised yet concerned.

"Lady Lutece, have you stayed here all night? I assumed you went to bed by the time I had come back from Fink's." Rosalind ignored Gerald's pleas. The butler cleared his throat.

"Oh please, Gerald, I can take care of myself." The butler shook his head.

"Very well Lady Lutece. Am I to refute inquiries for the rest of the day? What about the workers?"

"Refute the inquiries and I will be done before the workers come." The butler did not wait to be excused to leave.

"Unless one of us perishes in our sleep, we have time. May I have assurance you will not?" Robert continued.

"If only in the will it stipulates I get the particle if you do." Rosalind quipped back. Robert smiled.

"No, Rosalind. Do have sweet dreams though." He sighed and observed his newly changed surroundings. Weak sunlight flittered in through the blinds, dancing the early hours away, raising the fires to the high skies. The night had left them and the shadows a long forgotten memory. He counted paper after paper of Morse code and deciphering. Robert stood up, stretching his tired legs and back and gave another glance to the dark particle. He walked to the blinds and opened them. The light momentarily blinded him yet as his eyes adjusted, he beheld a warm sunrise and he wondered briefly what a sunrise would look like in a flying city.

x-x

I made more words happen. Hooray! It took quite a lot rewrites to get this chapter down. The interaction between the Luteces went many ways before I was satisfied. This first draft of this was nowhere near this. The more I expounded on the idea the more it felt odd. Hopefully, I did right by this version.


	4. Chapter 4

Midafternoon rays played off the polished steel of a busy typewriter, bouncing from impressed letter to impressed letter, lighting their gilded edges. Fingers moved swiftly tailoring words to fit thesis and probability, to fit impossibilities and amazement, to match the technical achievements of the night. An occasional pause, various corrections with the eraser and brush, and then a sudden continuation of the scientific symphony, keeping precious time to the second. The conversations of the fascinating other lay beside her, cleanly rewritten and reformatted, yet still red markings littered the margins of particle frequencies and energies.

The typewriter ended with a soft clink. She removed the completed paper to have it laid amongst its brethren. It settled beneath the pile, the cover page showcasing the "The Possibilities of Application upon the Circumstances of Quantum Entanglement: The Introduction of Instantaneous Communication, R. Lutece." With a tumbling noise, the typewriter was reset. Another blank page was pulled nearby, its end rolled around the carriage. A quick replacement of the ink ribbon and the symphony continued flowing out the open window, joining the chorus of songbirds and the commotion of the workers below.

A cool wind blew in, refreshing her small office. The soft hands of air tugged at her curtains, rubbed against the spines of her books, and searched every tiny crevice of her shelves and desk. It stirred her papers curious to the implications but a mighty paperweight, a metal molecule, prevented its passage, holding well its owner's secrets. The door opened, a piercing creak broke through the euphony. Rosalind, none too bemused, dropped her baton and turned around in her chair to face the interloper.

Gerald bowed in apologies, an arm held out perfectly balancing a full tea tray, no china daring to make a noise, no mail daring to be spilt, and a bowl of peaches very daring to offend. With an articulate offer, he handed her a steaming cup of honeyed tea and the daily letters and inquiries. Rosalind replied with a curt recognition, taking a sip of the offer and deposing the mail elsewhere on the desk. The bowl of peaches sat besides, fully ignored. Gerald expressed an inclination for health. Rosalind rebuffed, setting the tea down by the typewriter what then clicked to life. Again without the need to be told, Gerald bowed once more and left his mistress with the creaking of a closing door.

In the midst of another sip, Rosalind came along with a certain idea. It may be very well that she could communicate with Robert for the rest of her life through Morse code yet she denied thinking that such cumbersome way was her only option, or that she was limited in the first place. She set the cup down, peering in, her face reflecting back in the waters. She had done it before numerous times for Comstock, tears through which probability was shown. It was through a tear Comstock saw a grand flying city.

Initially she thought these looking glasses only shown what could happen, a situation similar to Schrodinger's cat. Such cat would be either of two states, dead or alive, and would be both until the box was opened. The cat would be observed in only one state from then the universe would continue. The state not observed would simply collapse into nothingness. This explained why she could not look into the past. Everything had already been decided. The universe was singular. She could see the options and their consequences before they were even encountered. She could open the box and see both a dead and alive cat without affecting decisional probability.

Yet the night tossed turmoil into this theory. It was found that the universe was not singular. It was plural, a forever branching chain of different choices and occurrences. She met a male version of herself, very alive. These tears showed not only what could happen but what has happened. She saw futures that truly existed. If these realities she saw into were real, could she bring something from that reality over? Could she go to a timeline in present step with hers and take for instance a person into a timeline where such person already existed, existing? What would be the consequences? Would the universe deny duplicates and simply delete the offending paradox?

Rosalind gazed at herself through a bronze glass, suddenly feeling very lonely.

x-x

The honeyed tea did nothing to calm his nerves. Robert held the estimate for the repairs of his door and groaned. He crumpled into the settee of his parlor careful to not spill the tea in his hand.

"Why is everything so expensive these days Gerald?" Robert tossed aside the paper and took another sip.

"It is what it is, Master Lutece, unfortunately. Much more than the monthly allowance. Am I to use the funds set away for your projects?" Gerald responded, setting up the parlor table with the lunch for the day. Robert sat back up and set down the now empty cup.

"No. Doors are not a necessity." Robert rubbed his hands in anxiety. Gerald handed him the mail. Robert sifted through the colored papers as Gerald refilled the tea cup and collected the estimate. Robert idly grabbed a cucumber sandwich in his reading.

"Yes, yes, go ahead." He motioned. Gerald nodded and left his master alone. Robert quickly finished the meal, discarding the letters on the table. He leaned forward, hands clasped together. Closing his eyes, he ruminated on the night before. It seemed so much like a dream, a wanting of the subconscious for wonderment and impossibility. What seemed to make sense so well before became foggy and too fantastic. Robert huffed, a thought stating he would not have been surprised if he had checked and all he saw were blank sheets of paper.

He entered his laboratory, still in immense disarray. Papers lingered on the floor, lethargic to cleanliness, mooring themselves over grey tiles and black cables. Morse code conversations draped the aluminum desk from corner to corner, hanging over the edges, tired and limp. No, not a dream, a new reality. A small smile formed on his face. The laboratory was moderately sized and decently stocked. Some devices were in need of repair and other slept underneath a thick layer of dust. The wooden cabinets that dotted the room were chipped and stained. Their glass fronts showcasing medals and textbooks, dissertations and small devices, and hidden in the corner a little stuffed eagle toy. It bemused him, really, to imagine this other Lutece with the same childhood memento.

Yet imagining the other Lutece proved a monumental difficulty. His premonitions about the ultimate conclusion about this construct left him ending the thought immediately. He coughed and readjusted his tie. No Robert, he chastised, a heat arising in his throat. A gentle wind stirred the papers around him, upheaving them from their slumbers. He stepped back surprised as the papers caught flight and wrapped themselves across his pant legs. He frowned and turned to face the wall beside him, clear of cabinets and tables. The rows of windows were still open from the morning.

"I hope nothing got in," he worried as he shut them one by one. The panes slid easily enough until the last. He fought harder on the wood. It creaked in return but offered nothing more. Robert huffed and walked away. Across the line of windows on one wall was an imaginary partition in the floor plan that housed his personal office marginally equipped with only a few file cabinets, a desk, and a typewriter. Robert approached the area, brushing off some of the dirt and dust that had come in with the wind. He checked under the desk but found more piles of books and misplaced instruments. He swept around overturning the occasional folder and crate.

At last, Robert found hiding between the filing cabinets a rusty toolbox. With some effort, Robert managed to pry the toolbox out, the old metal grinding against the aluminum walls. With a click of the latch Robert opened the top and began rummaging for a screwdriver. The tools clanked about his efforts and bit back his hands as he searched. Robert flinched back, his thumb pricked by an ornery nail. He scrutinized his digit but thankfully found no drawn blood. He turned back to the toolset deciding it better not to offer his whole hand again. Robert carefully excavated the nails, nuts, and bolts until he found the screwdriver.

With finally the tool in hand, Robert went back to the stubborn window. The pane clattered against the wind and the view outside showed the busting populace on their daily rounds past his building. Robert made no attempt to appreciate the view however as he set the screwdriver between the pane and the jam. Again, he forced the wood and the pane jerked from its holdings and slid down somewhat before catching itself despite Robert's momentary triumph.

"Damn," he muttered. The gap was still a few inches open. Robert went about settling the screwdriver in a different position as a little bird landed on the windowsill. It hopped, once, twice around, pecking the wood in its notches and holes. It watched a man grunt and hammer a stuck window, then sigh, then run a hand through his hair with the other carefully probing the seams. It chirped, breaking his furious intent. Robert noticed the little bird as it kept chirping and singing, calling for his attention. He gave it a passing glance, observing its solo and dance. The light reflected off its black plumage as it hopped to and fro. If it wants food, it is going to have to go elsewhere, Robert concluded.

With a swift motion of the hand, he brushed the bird away, pushing it to the edge of the sill. The bird stopped its chirping in response but refused to move on preferring instead to sit in the corner watching the people below. Robert kept observing the black bird as it observed the people, more often than not, the people right below it. Robert, curious, followed suit and peered out his window.

There were people of all sorts as they went about their business. Set up nearby was a flower peddler. The rows of blossoming flowers, bursting rainbows, in various pots and baskets attracted the ladies and their husbands as well as the lucky suitor hoping to impress. A newsboy took business to the street corner, announcing the daily headlines, trading papers for coin. Dozens of people entered and exiting the shops across. Some left with parcels of butchered meat, some with candies, and others with papers and books. It was a sort of reverie, he felt, to simply watch the world pass by. Robert set the screwdriver down and continued his distraction. He leaned on the pane, his arms crossed across his chest.

The little black bird chittered and Robert with a fancy reached out. The little head bobbed under Robert's fingers. It chittered again poking its beak between his digits before suddenly dropping off the sill and spreading its wings. Robert watched as it sauntered the skies before dipping and disappearing out of sight. Robert scanned the street below in wonder.

Dread smothered the pleasure. In front of his building door sat waiting a black carriage, the chestnut horses panting and snorting in their leather bridles. Beside them stood three men, two of whom he had recognized. The third was the carriage driver Robert presumed noticing the driving whip. The men seemed to be in the midst of an argument. No doubt about the fare, he hissed, but a worry started to grow. It was nowhere near the end of the week.

His lips curled to a sneer. Robert snatched the screwdriver and drove it into the side of the pane. With one fell blow, he shut the window with a mighty clatter. He abandoned the tool on the windowsill and attended to the coded messages on the aluminum table, collecting them in his arms.

He made his way to the wooden desk of his office and stuffed the messages in the red leather folder. He opened one of the drawers and hid the precious information. He opened one of the file cabinets. A sick feeling of apprehension corroded him from the inside. His eyes flickered to the open arch repeatedly as he sifted through his work. Various projects and other patentable matters were pulled and placed atop the wood desk.

A slam of the aluminum and Robert checked the amount laden before him. Perhaps enough to tide them over, he hoped. He brushed through his hair and sighed. A knock on the door frame alerted him to their presence. Gerald, brow shining with sweat, was at the head, the two men behind him. Robert narrowed his gaze and replaced his hands in his pockets. The butler opened his mouth to speak only to be interjected by Robert.

"Yes, I know Gerald, Mr. Lappet and Mr. Polemaetus,"he spoke forcing nonchalance. He bit his lip to further hide his disdain. Gerald nodded and allowed the men in before bowing to Robert then leaving. Robert watched the vultures enter, neglectful of the papers beneath them. The cane tapped on the floor, mimicking the taps of claws on stone. The larger body trampled onwards, clumsily holding a worn Gladstone bag.

"How do you do, Mr. Lutece?" Mr. Lappet announced, tipping his crushed bowler hat in a greeting dripping with all but niceties, a pretense for business. His pencil mustache twitched always over his crooked half smile. As if I would deign to accept the deceit, Robert condemned. Robert simply gathered the files on his desk and marched toward the hungry predators. Just like the day before, he found himself facing the maw of hunger and greed. Yet not like before will he allowed them to break his progress.

"As stalwart as ever." Mr. Lappet idled on his cane, eyeing the offering Robert had. Robert noticed the missing head on the cane. This observation entertained a cruel delight but Robert knew better than to act upon it.

"Quite sooner than the end of the week," Robert chided, laying the projects on the aluminum table. Mr. Lappet frowned and shrugged.

"My watch might've run fast." Robert glared at the mustard fronted vulture scavenging for sustenance, picking at the remains. The vulture clawed with aversion, only willing to touch the most delectable parts. The claw dropped the papers. Mr. Lappet turned to Robert with a raised eyebrow, his eyes searching for dishonesty. The cane pointed to the machine. "Why nothing on that?"

"Because it is of no importance minor work for a future thesis on some quantum construct. Nothing that you can patent Lappet. That is solely for the scientific community." Robert retorted. Lappet held his head to one side and narrowed his gaze, his cane tapping all the while.

"Then where is all the funding going?" Lappet asked, taking his hat off and placing it on the other projects. Robert indicated to the neglected offering. Lappet's grin dropped a slight shade and the tapping stopped. He replaced the hat on his head and took the seat by the table. The vulture, desperate in its need, cannot afford to be so picky, Robert mused. "Just to have it out there Lutece, I am disappointed. Now you won't mind a punishment then; it's just a little thinning out."

The implications were clear. Robert scowled openly. Lappet scoffed with that arrogant turn of his lips. He watched Lappet thoroughly examine the work then the brute, still tipping occasionally, oddly. Yet it meant much for his funding, Robert understood. It was drying up in the face of new prospects. Robert eyed the machine in disgusted worry. He needed Lappet as Lappet needed him. His chances of getting a new funder so quickly were too slim for attempt, particularly on the eve of great discoveries. Rage simmered underneath. To be at the whim of money, he inwardly winced.

As he watched the brute in its strange frolic, he noticed the Gladstone bag was opened if only slightly. The lean man missing his crown jewel and the bag, full of what? He questioned. It must still be the problem of debt. Robert in his curiosity edged towards the brute, attempting not to arouse the attention of the vulture in meal. The brute shrugged his shoulders and leaned back on the counter, obviously bored with the waiting. Robert pretended to be engaged in cleaning up the laboratory, observing the brute on the edge of falling asleep yet then again, the only times he saw the brute ever active was in the act of violence or destruction. A feeble mind cannot take such lack of savage excitement, he mocked.

Robert collected the last of the trampled papers, ending near the jaded beast that only begrudgingly moved for the pieces he had stood on. It snorted at Robert's presence but made no attempt to dislodge him. An overwhelming stench of alcohol emanated from the beast. Drunk by midafternoon, how pleasant, Robert rolled his eyes. He checked the innards of the bag yet no surprise came over him. It was just cash after all, exactly as expected. However Robert did wish he could have seen the gambling match to have provoked such sum.

He glanced back to the beast, disgruntled and weary, slowly working off the poison of the pub. On a good day, Robert would have been nowhere near the beast and on this day, the very beast did not care. What harm could a stringy small man do? All he needed was another drink, preferable after this visit to this stringy man's strange place. Lappet always made him wait for so long. Just take it all he thought.

A desperate thought startled Robert's mind, funding, moreover, the lack of it. Theft, he considered with aversion, would theft be worth it? Yet he could not help but to glance ever so to the cash, guarded so poorly. For science, he rationalized, for the good use of it. Yet would he really fall to such pettiness? Rage still roasting under the surface, he hissed underneath his breath, he was not jealous.

Robert placed the load of papers on the counter to which the beast in boredom shoved back to the floor. The papers floated each way in their new freedom, back to the lethargy of before. Robert glared to the beast's cruel smirk.

"On your knees for your precious words," it growled. Robert bit his tongue to avoid remark. He hesitantly dropped to the floor, gathering the lost. The beast threw his head back and groaned. Robert saw the beast turn to the windows, watching the outside go. Robert steeled his outraged mind and slipped his hand into the bag. He lifted the bills by a moderate stack and drew them out without a single flutter. The beast had not noticed. The vulture still occupied. Robert not bothering to count the amount hid the bills in the shelves under the counter. He just needed enough to tide him over Lappet's end of days.

He dared another chance. His hand was in mid act as Lappet called to his beast. It lurched forward, knocking Robert back. The bills in his clutch dropped to the floor to which he hastily covered in the papers. The beast kicked Robert away in annoyance, his body thrown against the shelves; various instruments unsettled crashing to the floor. Lappet faced the uproar yet cared only to spot some loose bills nearby.

"Marshal, careful with the load, it's enough with you gallivanting everywhere," Lappet scolded, specifying the dropped hundreds. The beast bent down on command and replaced the seemingly careless matter of missing bills. Lappet gathered a few of the folders and shouted. "Have you had that open the entire day?"

"So what," the beast grunted in return. "I've been careful."

"You've been drunk. You still are drunk. You tried to pay off the fare using that." Marshal clicked his tongue in annoyance and took effort to latch the Gladstone bag properly. Lappet still not reassured went on to decry, "I shouldn't have paid that damned heeb. You probably left a few hundreds in that carriage, always getting a hand in there, wanting to be important."

Robert started at the new turn of events. Lappet was riled beyond precedence. The shadow over Robert moved on to face his accomplice. Lappet pointed and yelled, grabbing the bag from Marshal. "If this bag ends up a lot lighter than it should be-"

"Yeah, yeah. No worries. I'm in the same goddamn boat you are. We done yet?" The beast brushed him off. Lappet huffed in anger.

"We're done." Lappet walked up to Robert on the floor clutching his bruised side. The vulture towered above its prey. Lappet sneered as if to say something to assert his control but the words died on his lips. Lappet muttered to the beast some unintelligible command and they left him without a single suspicion. Robert was amazed, now realizing the magnitude of pressure that was on Lappet. A lighter bag was no if, it was a reality. Robert did not want to know how it ended.

His heart throbbed painfully. Would he be suspect or would Marshal the beast take the fall? Robert rubbed his side. What did he just do? He let his body collapse to the floor, his hands covering his face. He thought in paranoia until the paranoia burned away to a fury. What did he care? Two loan sharks getting their comeuppance, not him. What did it matter? The consequences did not apply to him.

Truly it was jealousy, he now admitted, sorting the cash from the papers and collecting the hidden sum. He wondered what turn of events occurred to prevent the creation of a man by the name of Comstock. Everything was accounted for on the tables and put away; the linoleum floor finally rid of the paper infestation. Robert fell onto his office chair, exhausted, wondering what could be done to make his mind at ease. He failed to notice Gerald setting tea on the table and the receipt of the doors.

"At my expense, Robert."

x-x

Late afternoon rays shimmered off the steel workings of the dancing typebars, each working their instrument to perfection, every letter, every stroke, a note in a beautiful masterpiece. One by one, each word appeared on the white plane, culminating into the venerable prospect he had before him. Starting slow and jagged, soon the wonder flowed through, a smooth and constant enlightenment that drove him on, a mind's escape.

"Quantum entanglement, the concept of objects becoming symbolically inseparable, the result of physical interaction then separation to create the exact same quantum mechanical state. Once entangled, a singular object cannot be truly described without consideration of the other." The writings continued, page after page of hypothesis and query. "During observation, particle 47 has shown evidence of quantum entanglement, acting as a transceiver to another exact particle…"

His symphony ended in sudden silence. The ever darkening laboratory felt colder by the second. He swept around. He was alone here. Robert swallowed hard, a lump in his throat refused to remove itself. A pang of paranoia blew through him. Nervous eyes darted to the hidden cash in the drawers. He needed it, Robert tried to assure himself. It would have been used for much better acclaims than whatever the vulture planned for it. He rubbed the back of his neck, the hairs pricking up in anxiety. There were no consequences for him.

Yet in the midst of darkness, a light dared cry out a proposition or a fancy but a theory without a thought of consequence. Robert stared at the particle. No, not exactly alone. For what did it matter, imploring once more, progress was his answer.

"For the sake of progress."

x-x

Even more words, much more than I had anticipated. I debated whether or not that this was acceptable. I just wanted to fulfill a need for history. Updates will come slower now that spring break has ended for me. Hopefully even with school I can continue this story. I would like to thank everyone for the time, the reviews, the favorites, and the follows.


	5. Chapter 5

Trepidation was the opening topic of the night debate. Despite best attempts, slow and stilted replies were nigh constant. An air of tenacious animosity hung about Robert. The admittance of jealousy did him no help. He waited through the preliminaries of their conversation, the how do you do, the expressions of their respective afternoons to which he replied a lie, a halfhearted nothing quite interesting, and the continuation of their extrapolation of their histories. Keen as Robert tried to seem, Rosalind knew the better.

"Why so terse tonight?" the result of an objective observation comparing the times of response from the night before, not that the observation was fully conscious with a watch in hand but the ominous feeling of general anxiety. Robert wrung his wrists, thinking of a passible reply. The urgings of an unwell mind continually pushed him to unease despite his rationalizations. It hindered, it gnawed, it ravaged the pits of his countenance; there it lied seething beneath the surface. An unruly problem and in spite of his solution, it refused to be solved.

"That is hardly a good question. Morse code does not quite encourage the length and ardor of conversation." Another unduly length of time, Rosalind noted. A small snarl, the rubbing of his nose with the side of his thumb, the aching of a bruised rib, the uncomfortable shiftings of an conflicted body, both ready to depart in a fury of displeasure but never fully desiring to leave the one person that offered him a seldom felt comfort. A pause in the mind struck from thin air. From when did he ever accept his other in such a way? Had I really thought a distant voice of another plane could render me not alone, he questioned. Especially a voice he had found so reviled over the passing of mere hours. The reply served to exasperate the strains.

"It may not, but that failed to discourage you last night. What is there to discourage you now?" Rosalind commented, now beginning to hypothesize upon the events on the other side. Robert struggled with formulating a civil reply. A strange curiosity broke the surface of malignance yet contained none the innocence usual in association. Another voice of cacophony echoed within the echelons of his thoughts. Another wave of agitation laid anchor upon the dredges. Another problem to be solved that Robert could not stand as he turned his head away in exasperation, facing the open arch, an encroaching darkness passing through the borders.

Rosalind meditated patiently by the particle whose light barely differed from the overhead lamps. The laboratory flushed with brightness, leaving shadows slight and hidden away. Her laboratory defied the changing outsides where a sun beckoned to his begotten, leading rays to abandon the world and where the darkness nipped at their heels and invaded their stead. A fountain pen lay stranded in the sea of white, a blank page left wanting of interaction.

Her hands were still from deciphering, from commanding words across time and space. Indeed, an upsurge of the same wanting transfixed itself inside Rosalind. During the afternoon foray in scientific thought, she had begun to consider the other Lutece an integral associate in her research only to have now, a stubborn man once again in the way of her progress. A loathing zeal grew ever larger as the seconds ticked away.

In his silence, he watched the orange haze of the afternoon roll across the floor, over the cabinets and the instruments, and out the windows. Partial darkness reigned behind the pale light on the particle. Robert's gaze then trailed to the desk. Only the typewriter was illuminated, the light playing off the brass detailing. A paper still captured in the carriage revealed his work in progress which reminded him of the magnitude of the occurrence before him.

Despite the hindering, gnawing, and ravaging, Robert forced settling to a lull less riled and vexed, coming to awareness that he kept Rosalind waiting.

"I suppose this is when we finally solve our particle?" Yet Rosalind was none convinced, the previous wanting had shifted to a new directive. An agitation worked its way, borrowing deep into Robert's stilted answers. Suddenly in the span of a single question, Rosalind suspected a lie, the same unfathomable intuition that reared its head last evening. Rosalind drawing from stubbornness denied his notion, replicating the lapses of tact that burdened Robert.

"How was your afternoon?" Robert frowned at the continuing provocation, wishing for the other to focus upon the main problem at hand. He crossed his arms, a fist hidden in the crook. "The main problem right now is you," Rosalind railed on, showing the remarkable ability to coincide with the insinuations of his mind. Robert kicked the floor.

"Enough of the-" The message was denied as Rosalind forced her way through.

"Because it annoys you, I know that, Robert." He clenched his fist at the interruption.

"Why do you insist upon knowing?" he demanded.

"Research," Rosalind decreed. She wanted data, any result that would aid her. Whether or not he would end up cooperating, she decided not to care. "I not do understand the predicaments that are placed upon you, but know this Robert that notable differences should be noted. The particle is not the only thing of interest."

"Irrelevant. I am not your experiment."

"Is relevant, especially if we are one and the same." It was very true and very fascinating. It was true that Rosalind could never correctly guess the events of another universe yet fascinating how her other lived in such a different life. She had assumed a minor conflict, a petty quarrel, or something rather insignificant to push Robert to such hostility and as she expected yet nonetheless still surprised, she was wrong.

"Oh, how my life is a pale shadow to yours?" The message was only half deciphered. She understood this heated assertion. Coming true was a trifling thought that dared to cry out during a moment of pause in her musical soliloquy. In the midst of a bowl of peaches rereading the conversions of night before, she read the tale of a missing preacher and a struggling young scientist. In her distance from him, she thought nothing of it, found it amusing for such a massive difference to occur in their timelines. She had a passing thought of the consequences that she now comprehended were very real for Robert.

The pen dropped without a sound and stayed undisturbed. It had felt like the universe had repeated the anger, the impatience, the mockery. Her hands dropped to her lap, one over the other. She watched a wild particle express resentment, disappointment, and jealousy.

Consequences ordinarily never mattered, not to her yet now the universe sought to deny such sheltered idea. The sheer knowledge, she conceded, of a better life beyond a wall was a painful Tantalus. To gaze through a keyhole of a door that never be opened had consequences that were not solely political or social but a sickness that could never die. Knowledge may have been progress but it was by no means solace.

Morse code or not, Robert allowed every word of poison, every instance of boiling anger to flow across time, his particle a vessel of hate with no understanding of cease fire.

And the fire burned itself to death. Smoldering ashes of a once blazing jealousy chocked his breath and seized his lungs. The exhaustion was as if he had shouted his voice dry yet all the evidence he had of his temper was the cold sweat and a tired body, his arms dropped listlessly to his sides. Anger had ebbed away and flowed in was the tide of self-loathing. He had made a grave mistake. Punished was his jealousy. His indulgence led to nothing. Gone was his opportunity, destroyed were his chances, and did they smite him. He was a victim not of his other but of circumstance, an objective drawing of events where he was not as lucky as he wanted and could do none to influence the outcomes. This he despised.

The dead particle offered no more resistance to the darkness that consumed with ravenous hunger what had been kept from it. Still he sat for minutes more, his head dropped and gaze downcast. Hands clasped together rubbing raw his knuckles. There he waited with bated breath for reply, any reply even if it was the scathing antagonism or the nigh impossible semblance of comfort. He beat the odds in a much different way. Fluttered to life, the particle shocked Robert as it dared to intrude upon his melancholy. The pattern was slow, repeating as if to invite him in once again. In reluctance, he translated.

"As you can see Robert, keeping someone waiting is a quite ungentlemanly act." Robert gaped at the particle. It chided, somehow still in good humor to fondly exacerbate, "Our meetings must stop starting like this. Once is enough, there is always an innate distrust of strangers particularly ones that tell you they are you. Yet any more than that is just annoying. Stop it." Robert sighed, running a hand through his hair. Her words however reproaching shaped a feeble smile, wholesomely glad yet provoking a wounded pride.

"The universe begs to differ. This seems to be quite constant," he answered attempting to reciprocate the wit. Finally satisfied with a prompt reply, she indulged Robert's line of thought.

"So it seems. What also seems to be constant is how I attract all sorts of overly dramatic people. I am not affected of idiotic tantrums Robert. Do not make such examples of me. I expect a refined gentleman." The words came with rapid succession as if to inspire ironic laughter. Halfway through the ever lengthening tirade of reputation and status, Robert finally grew wise to the satire and gave up decoding entirely. Even if the conversation was not entirely derailed by the prevalence of his jealousy, the tirade had none of the smatterings of comfort.

He stood up and stretched, ever watchful of a speeding particle. He shook his head and went to operate the lights of his laboratory. He flicked the switch and to life his home breathed as light bathed the great expanse from corner to corner, driving away the evening. By the time he had settled himself back beside the machine, the particle stood silent and waiting.

"I hate you." Rosalind decoded. She rolled her eyes.

"So do I and do believe such reactions are quite natural due who we are if I am to reflect the thoughts of others. Yet I have to work with you nonetheless. You require so much responsibility." Robert sat incredulous at the latter statement. "Anyways, I have come with a proposition. Most likely you have come to the same conclusions as me to which I trust you to know."

He was dumbfounded. Rosalind was becoming increasingly vague yet Robert pondered on her implications. Once again, he was drawn to the unfinished paper at his typewriter. Of course Morse code would be nowhere near satisfactory for either one of us, he thought. Of the various new ways of communication, eventually he focused on a completely hypothetical matter, a tear in time and space. To her, it was expected; to him, it was still new territory. He had managed some scant times to observe the phenomena, yet never was he able to replicate it with the control he preferred. It came to the point where his funding could not cover the always occurring damages these tears wrecked upon his equipment, the machine decommissioned years ago.

"Tears as source of visible communication?"

"Indeed, but not just communication. Crossing." Thunderstruck could hardly begin to express the alarm he felt. Was it possible? To exist where already do exist. In this he found a paradox, but this is what she proposed. He deciphered on, reading her explanations, her theories, her thoughts of consequences and to him, they were perfectly acceptable, sound. From this he traced every step of thought Rosalind and knew where reality deviated from expectation.

"This is where you are wrong," he began. Rosalind was pensive, oddly anxious for Robert's explanation. There was no jealousy, merely a grim acceptance of his fate. "I assume you have the ability to do what you want if you are to imply that tears are the new way of communication. But yet as you know, I have none of those luxuries. I do not have the same equipment as you do nor the funding. The method you propose will only be one sided."

Rosalind furled her brow at the particle. Despite her wants of a successful experiment, impasses still arose. It slipped her mind in her excitement of potential progress, while they were one and the same, their settings differed greatly and she could not aid. She clenched her teeth.

"I refuse to know you only as a name in Morse code." Robert laughed, assuming a more comfortable position.

"I almost believed that was sentimentality."

"Perhaps I wish it was. Always in romantic novels does everything fit so effortlessly." The Luteces sighed. Rosalind continued, "Is there any possibility for this experiment?"

Robert rubbed the back of his neck and remembered the stolen cash. He quickly ran to the desk and checked the amount. It was probable as he counted but his worry only expanded as he finished. For one time, he had enough to recommission his device, fix it to full operation, and open a single tear. If it failed for any reason, he would have to go begging to the vulture, an action he despised for that meant letting it know about the research he had spent months behind its back. To be at the whim of money, he repeated in despondency as he replaced the sum. He returned with a counter offer.

"I have left some funds but unfortunately, only once." Confused, Rosalind asked for clarification.

"Do you have a funder? It is really that small of a limit for you?" An urge to lie was soundly defeated by the knowledge that apparently Rosalind could tell, a concept that disturbed him highly yet bestowed upon him a thought if the disdain could be reciprocated.

"I do have a funder yet none so generous as your Comstock."

"I see." Rosalind wrung her wrists. So her Robert had only one chance. Realistically, he must have had more but Rosalind assumed it would be years to get another chance. Due to this she mused Robert had little data on the conducting tears, more so specifically aimed tears and even with the latter she still had trouble. It was planned to the letter, the slow incremental climb to crossing universes, yet now, the plan changed. He could not afford the methodical implementation. He had to brute force the desired result which Rosalind had little faith in.

Upon the aluminum desk, Robert now had the red folder. Splayed in front of him were scarce notes on tears and as he read through, he realized even if he did have the funding, he would not know where to start.

"Rosalind, what do expect as a successful result?" an idle question.

"To see each other?"

"Is that what you really want?"

"Of course, it is a perfectly acceptable outcome of our first experiment. If I have to spend a few more years of painstaking Morse code to see you again or to see you at all, then I will. What do you expect then Robert?" Rosalind tapped her paper with the pen, anxious for the reply.

"I want more." He found himself adamant beyond reason, an automatic response he found himself entirely devoted. Rosalind was speechless, a hand raised to her mouth. "I want to cross."

Rosalind refused to believe Robert to be so careless. "To cross without any previous experience is just inviting tragedy."

"I want to try," Robert pushed on while Rosalind tried dissuasion.

"I have never set up a tear that I could direct. You have not at all. Nevertheless, you want this work first time and straight to cross?"

"I do." Robert straightened in his chair, leaning ever forward.

"You are insane."

"Will you help me?" No would have been her answer, she would have thought, had that been the condition, yet Rosalind crumbled in the face of her own desires that Robert had finally worded. She was placed in a very uncomfortable position. Withdrawing slightly from the particle, she shook her head. There was nothing more she wanted than to see come to fruition this particular experiment but to disregard such danger was stupidity and a Lutece does not embark on stupidity. So for what reason did Robert Lutece dared venture out?

"Of course, I would help you, but I want one thing in return, explain to me what happened during your afternoon?"

"Irrelevant."

"Not good enough for your indulgence." Rebuttal ready at the tip of the fingers, Robert hesitated. As much as the good conversation did, the guilt of jealousy still weighed heavily. He had to make repayment. The weight in his throat returned but he complied to a voice he had barely known for an entire day. Again just as the night before, he relaxed into the storytelling that Rosalind so desired.

x-x

Gerald had finished his rounds about the home later than intended due to the evening not caring to wait for him as he exited the carriage, fresh from the woodworker's, finished with settling the issue of the doors. With a tip of the hat and a turn of a copper, he waved the driver off as the horses clattered down the cobbled ground. The soft yellow lamplight of the streets led the way up the few stairs, drifted in like stray dogs as the door opened only to disappear with the clatter of a lock and from there the offering of a good cup of tea to offset the indignation of two doors. A disconsolate young man he did not dare disturb further.

Yet some hours later wondering if it was still a good time to start a light dinner for Master Lutece, Gerald from the parlor, freshly cleared, headed to the laboratory. If Master Lutece even cared for nourishment to-night, Gerald mused remembering the past evening. Seldom did he ever intrude upon his master's work, but always was there curiosity.

The hallway was a den of darkness in the night, the black held at bay at the boundaries of the missing doors. Brightness served as the barriers as they stood fast as the laboratory sentinels. Gerald knocked on the door pane. Robert made a slight motion of his hand, signaling his acknowledgement but presented no invitation inside. He watched his master write in his notes, the occasional glance to his machine, a frown then a short laugh. Gerald waited patiently as he should, but peered in over to the office desk. The tea was more or less in the same position, untouched, yet the receipt was gone. A sudden raucous laughter jerked Gerald to attention. Robert held a hand over his mouth, failing to hide his ecstatic grin. On the cusp of some great discovery, Gerald supposed.

Another knock of the frame caused Robert to sigh and toy with his particle and finally, Robert turned from his work. He motioned Gerald nearer to which the butler obeyed. Robert, from his coat pocket, produced the receipt and died did the mirth and glared did reproach. Gerald nodded; the elderly gentleman with a white gloved hand confiscated the offending article.

"Yes, Master Lutece, I did pay for them."

"Why?" It was not an inquiry. It was a demand.

"Doors are a trivial matter. They were not of any importance."

"Which is exactly the point," interrupted Robert. "Why are you so keen on attending to this trifle?" The butler brushed a greying beard with a slow, lumbering thoughtfulness aged only through experience. At last, the hand pulled away.

"I seek no repayment, Master Lutece, I am simply caring for your compound." Gerald swept off the challenging glare with nary an ounce of effort. Robert raised an eyebrow to which Gerald ignored.

"Do you expect me to believe that is proper justification?" Robert sniped. Gerald had been his butler for years yet time did not beget fellowship. Instead, a tenuous relationship formed beside the subtle aggravations inside Robert directed towards the butler's presence. It was a constant reminder of debt. No funds of his were put away that could afford the help, Gerald was not his. He was Gerald's obligation and every time he was reminded of that, it irked him to no end. The provider of his living allowance provided him this man and upon most occasions there was no problem other than an abrupt salutation and shallow commentary.

"It is simple compassion." Gerald stated back. Robert scoffed. Gerald confronted his master, a voice often weak and cowardly drew from reserves deep but seldom forgotten. A cadence that forced Robert, that forced any in attending to listen. The fact that Gerald was not Robert's and therefore the sense of subservience never truly existed allowed for the occasional clash of very independent ideals. "I do not understand your abhorrence of good will just you cannot understand my choice of obligation. All of I ask of you Robert is just accept my offer."

"Obligation," Robert hissed under his breath. "Every time you bring up your damned obligation."

"There is no need for you mull on. It is not your business. Obligation is as important as you make of it. Nothing in life comes with intrinsic worth, not your wealth, nor your family or friends, not your knowledge or power. You place worth in life. You place as much as you think is needed. You choose what becomes important, Master Lutece," Gerald intoned, his hands in motion, palms up uplifting his words. A passion ruled his eyes, from where Robert was never able to find out. "And I have made my decisions." A pause, a rubbing of the back of his neck.

"Am I important to you?" was the singular response. Gerald stood fast against the inquiry, preferring honesty to lie.

"Was once." The words only fed the fire but Robert bit his tongue. He watched the passion fade from Gerald as he settled back down. "I would not advise you to place so much fixation upon wealth. There are worst things in life to be indebted to." Gerald's voice dropped as well as his gaze. A hush fell over their argument. Robert in effort to seem occupied dusted off his sleeves.

"You were a promise, Robert." Robert turned his attention a fraction.

"I am not anyone's pet." Gerald nodded to affirm.

"I am sorry that you think that way."

"Do not patronize me Gerald." Robert muttered, pacing in front the desk. "I am sick of your so called noble talk. How much are you being paid to care?"

"Enough to live decently," Gerald dictated, "yet if I was paid but naught a cent, I would still be here."

"A lie." Gerald was downcast.

"Yes, it is always quite tempting to turn promises into lies but that does not necessitate they always do." Gerald had the finality. Robert was on the edge of impatience and faced away, dismayed at the stagnant conversation. Gerald as stately as he had started did not bow but gave a curt good night.

"What did you mean by 'was once'?" Gerald heard behind his back. Facing the arch of darkness, Gerald intoned.

"I represent what you detest. You represent my failures."

x-x

I'm still going! Thank you for all the favorites and reviews, all the support.


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